Matt Freeman, chief executive (CEO) of Mediabrands Ventures, the corporate venturing unit of Interpublic Group (IPG), has joined another of the advertising services parent’s subsidiaries as chief innovation officer.
Freeman had been CEO of Mediabrands Ventures since January last year and will now be global head of innovation for McCann Worldgroup. Jimmy Poon, chief executive of Mediabrands also now leads its Ventures unit.
IPG has been an early investor in social network Facebook (it owns less than 0.5% according to news provider Financial Times) and its corporate venturing activities has come alongside peers, such Omnicom Group’s VC@OMD team run by Paul Leys, director of OMD’s Ignition Factory.